The hearthstone; or, Life at home

Miss Corson's Rules for Vegetables. — There is no better authority than Miss Corson on cooking, and her method for preparing vegetables is as follows : Spinach is an excellent dish when well cooked ; take two quarts, wash, boil for two minutes in salted boiling water, drain, chop and heat in a frying-pan for two minutes with an ounce each of butter and flour ; half a pint of meat broth is added, the compound is stirred and heated for five minutes, and served with small pieces of fried bread. Second only to spinach are beetsprouts, which will soon put forth their tender claims for consideration ; we all know them boiled, but after they are boiled they gain in flavor by being fried for two or three minutes in butter. New cabbage scalded five minutes in fast-boiling water, coarsely chopped, sprinkled with flour, salt and pepper, and gently stewed for five minutes with milk or cream enough to cover it, is good. So, too, is red cabbage sliced, thrown for fifteen minutes into scalding salted water and vinegar, then drained, and fried five minutes with butter, and served with a little hot meat gravy. Lettuce, which seems devoted to "salad days," is excellent stuffed; it is well. washed in salted cold water, the roots trimmed off, two tablespoonfuls of cooked force-meat of any kind, or chopped cold meat highly seasoned, inclosed within the leaves which are bound together with tape or strips of cloth ; several heads thus prepared are placed in a saucepan, covered with broth or cold gravy well seasoned, and set over the fire to simmer 454 THE hearthstone; or, life at home. about five minutes; the tapes are then removed and the lettuce heads and sauce are served hot. A link between cabbage and lettuce are Brussels sprouts, those tender, baby cabbages, which, stewed in cream, or quickly fried in butter, almost incline one's thoughts to vegetarianism. Beets are familiar enough boiled and sliced, either served hot with butter, pepper and salt, or pickled, but a novelty is a beet pudding, made by mixing a pint of cooked sugar-beets, chopped, with four eggs, a quart of milk, a little salt and pepper, a tablespoonful of butter, and baking them about half an hour ; cold boiled beets sliced and fried with butter are palatable ; to cook them so that none of their color shall be lost, carefully wash them without breaking the skin or cutting off the roots or stalks, and boil them until tender, about an hour, in boiling salted water. Turnips, either white or yellow, stewed in gravy, are excellent. Choose a quart of small, even size ; peel them ; boil them fifteen minutes in well-salted boiling water; drain them; put them into a fryingpan with sufficient butter to prevent burning ; brown them ; stir in a tablespoonful of flour ; cover them with hot water ; add a palatable seasoning of salt and pepper, and stew them gently until tender. Or peel and cut them in small, regular pieces ; brown them over the fire with a little butter and a slight sprinkling of sugar; add salt and pepper, and boiling water enough to cover them, and gently stew them until tender; serve them hot.